Well I gave into temptation and bought my first VFT last night and have no clue what I'm doing. We have rather mild winters down here (well mild considering I used to live outside of Amarillo with snow blowing all the time) and it usually drops down into the 30's-40's at the coldest part. I've seen everyone's post that they need to go outside instead of being kept inside, so do I need to park it out on the patio so it goes dormant or will it freeze it to death? and do i need to repot into the perlite/moss mix? It's a "Lowe's special", I'd been wanting one and saw it and figured why not give it a shot?
No idea what I'm doing...........
Hi Bayllw
Looks like there's lots of newbies to the CP forum, myself included. Hard to resist aren't they? I've been getting info from the International Carnivorous Plant Society. They have growing info. Here's a link I found helpful :http://www.sarracenia.com/faq.html
http://cobraplant.com/ is also great. They have YouTube videos describing how to care for them. You can find them on their site.
Tommy's and Starsplitter's posts are great, always reassuring. Nice to have the info verified by someone who's done it.
Good luck!
Sherri
Biggest vft killer is using tap water (the salts in it eventually kill the plant) and hand feeding the pitchers (snapping them shut for nothing or a lifeless bug uses up energy).
Welcome to the newbie VFT, there is several of us.
You will enjoy the link seray has given, those folks
have a lot of good information.
RRM
bayllw,
Welcome! Where you are I'd leave it out side for now. Sit in a tray of an inch of rain or distilled water only. FULL Sun. You should be fine. Don't worry about re-potting for now.
Don't worry about feeding it. Sunlight is MORE important.
Google "Venus flytrap care" in the meantime to learn more, there is a LOT of info out there!
HAVE FUN!
This message was edited Nov 24, 2009 9:11 PM
I never had much luck with them until my son decided to start feeding them the tiny crickets I used to sell at the pet store, LOL.
KYWOODS- So you still have those same vft now?
Nope, my son moved back to CA, lol. But he had them healthy, growing, producing more traps, and they were just Lowe's specials, too!
well they are currently parked on my patio table in full sun and setting in an inch of distilled water
**fingers crossed**